rightness that dazzles, yet does not
weary, of rich mosaic beauty of sensuous softness. Yet, with it all,
there is a singular lack of elevation of thought and expression;
everything tends to degrade, to drag the mind to a worse than earthly
level. The crudity of the warriors, the minute description of the
battles, the leper, Hann; even the sensual love-scene of Salammbo and
Matho, and the rites of Taint and Moloch. Possibly this is due to the
peculiar shortness and crispness of the sentences, and the painstaking
attention to details. Nothing is left for the imagination to complete.
The slightest turn of the hand, the smallest bit of tapestry and
armor,--all, all is described until one's brain becomes weary with the
scintillating flash of minutia. Such careful attention wearies and
disappoints, and sometimes, instead of photographing the scenes
indelibly upon the mental vision, there ensues only a confused mass of
armor and soldiers, plains and horses.

But the description of action and movement are incomparable, resembling
somewhat, in the rush and flow of words, the style of Victor Hugo; the
breathless rush and fire, the restrained passion and fury of a
master-hand.

Throughout the whole book this peculiarity is noticeable--there are no
dissertations, no pauses for the author to express his opinions, no
stoppages to reflect,--we are rushed onward with almost breathless
haste, and many times are fain to pause and re-read a sentence, a
paragraph, sometimes a whole page. Like the unceasing motion of a column
of artillery in battle, like the roar and fury of the Carthaginian's
elephant, so is the torrent of Flanbert's eloquence--majestic, grand,
intense, with nobility, sensuous, but never sublime, never elevating,
never delicate.

As an historian, Flanbert would have ranked high--at least in
impartiality. Not once in the whole volume does he allow his prejudices,
his opinions, his sentiments to crop out. We lose complete sight of the
author in his work. With marvellous fidelity he explains the movements,
the vices and the virtues of each party, and with Shakespearean tact, he
conceals his identity, so that we are troubled with none of that Byronic
vice of 'dipping one's pen into one's self.'

Still, for all the historian's impartiality, he is just a trifle
incorrect, here and there--the ancients mention no aqueduct in or near
Carthage. Hann was not crucified outside of Tunis. The incident of the
Carthaginian women cut